DAMBUDZO is a live anti-genre installation work by the artist, choreographer, and performer nora chipaumire (b. 1965, Mutare, Zimbabwe). chipaumire splits her time between Berlin, New York, and Harare. She studied dance in Africa, Cuba, and Jamaica before settling in New York, where she composes and performs “live art”, an art form made up of living elements and which takes on an evolving process; it seeks bodily experience and development of expression that languages seem to limit.
A collaboration with SPIELART, DAMBUDZO transforms the Westgalerie with an installation, combining sound, painting, sculpture, and performance—continuing chipaumire’s exploration of the dissonance between knowledge and language specific to those educated under colonial projects. The artist explores the revolutionary potential of performance and confronts colonial legacies by featuring a Zimbabwean shabini, an informal bar set up in private homes, where people come together to imagine possibilities of resistance and insurrection against political powers. chipaumire draws inspiration from the meaning of the word “dambudzo”, which denotes trouble in Shona, also evoking the ideas of radical African thinkers such as Dambudzo Marechera. Through bodily expression, the artist explores a language that goes beyond words, seeking to transcend the limits imposed by language. She uses movement as a personal and universal means of communication, enabling a more subtle and intuitive understanding.
The two-day programme is realised in cooperation with SPIELART Munich.